CA: Proposition 8 ruled unconstitutional by Ninth Circuit, 2-1

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled Proposition 8, the California State Constitutional Amendment banning same-sex marriage, unconstitutional, by a 2-1 vote, affirming a lower court ruling. The MSNBC link is here.

Perez Hilton has a fancy site (overly so) with a brief story here. 

The Los Angeles Times has posted a PDF of the opinion here.

“Proposition served no purpose, and had no effect, other than to lessen the status and dignity of gays and lesbians in California,” the court write. 

Later comments say that the Ninth Circuit pointed out that California law gives same-sex couples all benefits "manually", so denial use of the legal term "marriage" seems intended to offend or injure. This argument would not mean that other states could not outlaw same-sex marriage if they also outlawed civil unions (like Virginia Marshall-Newman) so there is a poison pill in the opinion.

Same sex marriages, at such, will not start until the appeal before the Supreme Court is carried out. (I suppos there could be an en banc appeal first.)

Wikipedia attribution link for 9th Circuit building.